Visionary Homes

Visionary Homes

HEADLINE: VISIONARY HOMES:

IMPROVING RELATIONSHIPS ONE HOME AT A TIME Building high-quality, affordable residences requires a motivated team, fueled by genuine caring.

Written by Dawn Killough Produced by Stephen Marino

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Visionary Homes co-founder and CEO Jeff Jackson attributes the company’s success to caring about every home they build and every customer they serve. “Our goal is to leave every interaction that we have, whether it be with a trade partner, homeowner, community member, or a city worker, to leave that relationship in a better place than we found it.”

Visionary Homes, an affordable housing builder in Logan, Utah, began in 2004 when Jackson partnered with Justin Cooper. Both left their own homebuilding businesses, figuring they were stronger together, to compete against a surge of national home builders that had begun to flood the Utah market. They initially focused on custom homes up until 2020, then shifted to quality affordable housing for first and second-time homebuyers. About half of their

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current portfolio is multi-family, consisting of condominiums and townhomes.

“Not a factory” Make no mistake, just because their homes are affordable doesn’t mean they’re any less desirable. “When we talk about good design,

Visionary Homes

the quality of the trade partners that we use, the quality of the products that we use, we are not just a factory of houses,” Jackson said. “We care about every single home that we put out.

We want to make sure that we’re giving our customers the best value for their dollar.”

Like any successful business, they rely on the talent of their people to drive their success.

They don’t self-perform any work, so they focus on recruiting construction management students from the four schools offering degrees in their region. “We’re very active in all four programs, supporting them, going to their career fairs, and speaking at classes to explain the industry and get them excited about it.”

They also have a robust internship program every summer. They hire between five and fifteen interns each year and typically

extend offers to about 80% of those interns.

Jackson spends a lot of his time securing top talent and making sure they’re happy.

Luckily, their reputation as a company has grown. They had six top-tier applicants for a recent vice president of sales position, with some candidates coming from national home builders.

“We care about every single home that we put out. We want to make sure that we’re giving our customers the best value for their dollar.”

Jeff Jackson, Co-founder and CEO

Finding good trade partners is a struggle for any builder. Visionary has a rigorous onboarding process designed to bring the best

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Visionary Homes talent to the top. “We’re definitely not looking for the lowest price. We keep an extensive database of costs that says roofing should cost this much a square and drywall should be this much. The second we get pricing, we’re throwing it into our database to see if they’re in line with the market. And if they’re way below market, we know that’s not sustainable.”

ask them: Are they good to work with? Are they hard to work with? Do they cause you problems? We allow our field supervisors, who work with them day to day, to have input on what trades we work with.”

Giving Back

Visionary Homes believes in giving back “We also vet them to find out if they understand to the communities that support them. One their own business. Do they know where of their largest efforts is a yearly summer their margins should be? Do they understand concert that attracts around 5,000 people. where their costs should be? And if they pass They invite all the service providers in the that test, then we start doing reference and county, including schoolteachers, firefighters, insurance checks on them.” police officers, and city workers, and their trade partners and employees.

Customer experience is their number one priority, whether it’s their employees or trade Additionally, they collaborate with other contractors. “As a builder, we’re only as good contractors on an annual diaper drive. as our weakest link. Home buyers can have Diapers are donated and then used by each a phenomenal experience right up until the builder to construct a house. They are then carpet goes in or right up until the closing given to those in need. table. And if they have a bad experience at the closing office or with the carpet layer, that’s Visionary partners with the Malouf what the buyer remembers about us. It’s not Foundation, which fights human trafficking that 99 other people did a phenomenal job. It’s and child abuse and provides support for that the weakest link left a sour taste in their survivors. Through their Rooms Restored mouth.” initiative, the foundation offers child survivors the opportunity to makeover their bedrooms through a safe, trauma-informed process. “A “We’re definitely not looking lot of the crimes against these victims happen for the lowest price.” in their own homes. So, for many of them, Jeff Jackson, Co-founder and CEO they have flashbacks or nightmares about their own bedroom.” Visionary has worked Management meets with their superintendents on several of these projects and offers a way once a year to rate their field of trade partners for home buyers to contribute by purchasing and determine who they’ll continue working furniture through Downeast’s Curated Spaces with. Partners are rated on their safety, collection. quality, customer satisfaction, and price. “We

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“I didn’t want an office job” Growing up, Jackson didn’t want an office job, as his father was a certified public accountant, so he started doing roofing, framing, and concrete. “I thought I would always stay in that hands-on, custom home-building world.”

He owned his own home building company for a while before joining partner Justin Cooper in 2004.

They started Visionary Homes in Logan, Utah, which is about a hundred miles north of Salt Lake City. Without a capital partner, they relied on grit and joint ventures with landowners to fund their operations. They brought in their first capital partner, Blue Diamond Capital out of Provo, in 2017.

In 2023, they began to attract interest from Misawa Homes in Japan. They finalized negotiations with Misawa in June 2024.

Jackson has also invested some of his own funds, as well as a few other small investors.

“We allow our field supervisors, who work with them day to day, to have input on what trades we work with.”

Jeff Jackson, Co-founder and CEO

In June 2024, Cooper stepped back from his position to become a minority owner, though Jackson credits him for building many of the company’s processes.

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Visionary Homes Visionary averages about 800 homes a year, and Jackson’s role has morphed into managing homeowners’ expectations and creating and reporting on the company’s vision to its financial backers.

A Virtual Future Given the growing popularity of online car purchases, Visionary is working on integrating technology into the home-buying experience.

“The idea is that you can shop for a Visionary home at midnight on our website. You’ll be able to fly over our communities, see what homes are available, drop in, and take a visual tour.

Once you’ve narrowed it down to a specific community or floor plan, then you reach out to our online sales team.”

Visionary offers pre-sales in new communities and has some inventory in stock. There are incentives to make pre-sales more attractive, but if someone needs a home quickly, they do have options. They have several preferred lenders, and their goal for an inventory home sale is 45 days to close.

For those looking to get into the industry, Jackson advises them to keep learning and work on soft skills, like leadership. “It doesn’t matter whether you’re a superintendent, salesperson, a purchaser, or in land acquisition; if you’re going to be successful, you have to have leadership skills.”

And he takes his own advice, recently receiving a finance degree from the Wharton

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School at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. “I’ve grown in my career and am more involved in the financial side of the business. I often found myself in meetings where terms and acronyms were used, which I would need to research later. It drove me crazy.

So, I decided I was going to get a degree in finance so that I could better understand what I was learning. It’s made a world of difference.”

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Visionary Homes

COMPANY INFORMATION Company Name: Visionary Homes Country: United States Industry: Residential construction Est: 2004 Premier Services: Affordable housing builder CEO: Jeff Jackson Website: visionaryhomes.com

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VISIONARY HOMES 2427 N Main Street Logan, UT 84341 P: 435.228.4702